


Sunshower

by almost_teacup



Series: Jean Starts a Band ‘verse [1]
Category: Fullmetal Alchemist - All Media Types, Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood & Manga
Genre: F/F, F/M, Gen, Mostly Crack, Post-Canon, they're ridiculous
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-04-18
Updated: 2019-11-14
Packaged: 2020-01-15 20:29:09
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 4
Words: 9,940
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18506500
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/almost_teacup/pseuds/almost_teacup
Summary: Roy and Olivier, two esteemed generals currently working in Central, make a bet: whoever can win over a certain girl first wins. Unfortunately neither of them actually knows the girl, both are ridiculous flirts, and neither are willing to back down. This is how Olivier learns to love Team Mustang, and how Roy learns just how much he appreciates Riza. Alex Armstrong is himself, Havoc acquires a banjo, and various other matters.(This is also how alchemical consultant Lily Rutherford learns not to be intimidated by state officials, even if they're pretty.)





	1. If you Took to Me

**Author's Note:**

> When it’s raining and sunny at once.

Olivier often wished that she hadn't sent Miles out to the Restoration.

No, that wasn't it. The Restoration was the only place for Miles. She knew a person couldn't be away from where they were called, by their own heart or by their superior officers, and if those two calls were different it could tear a person apart. She tried to remember that for her men, especially for someone as brilliant as Miles. He'd never have been content anywhere else knowing what was happening out in the desert. She wasn't entirely heartless.

She was, however, entirely infuriated by these idiots. The team - Roy's team - had invited her out for the evening, and she went, hoping to have a quiet drink and then walk home by herself. Three hours later she was already three drinks in and most definitely not walking home. This was what she got for being friendly. And responsible. And doing the thing that Miles always called 'bonding with your coworkers.' The time-honored Armstrong tradition of 'not giving a damn' was not to be observed. He'd advised her of that enough times. He'd insisted often enough to befriend her. That was how they'd come to know one another, and she was grateful, and she would've been more grateful if he was at her side now.

Havoc took note of something and ran across the street after it, in a rather recklessly flailing manner, which made Olivier reconsider Miles' advice for the hundredth time that night. Fuery soon did the same, pointing at a sign that said "beer" and yelling "beer," at which point everyone else followed him like ducklings. Such observations must have been hard to come by in Central. Either that or Roy's team was just as senseless as their General. It was like they all thought they were invincible once they changed out of uniform. Maybe they did. They had some precautions - Olivier had a rapier at her side, she knew Roy never went without his gloves, and Hawkeye had to have been armed. Not that any of them except Olivier herself would be particularly useful in this state. All the artillery in the world wouldn't do them much good this far gone.

Olivier had expected Hawkeye to be better than this. She'd imagined the two of them rolling their eyes at the others' antics, sharing some kinship over it, maybe finding more reasons to talk after such a night, maybe seeing more and more of one another in the coming days - but alas. The woman was wandering along right with them, not as enthusiastically as Havoc or Fuery, but all the same she seemed dazedly happy. Not talkative but not guarded either. She had seemed such since the second place they visited. Even the sharpshooter wasn't at the ready tonight, not that there was much to be concerned about or ready for. This wasn't Briggs.

This was a place that you could run around in, a place where there was no threat of hypothermia or spies or roaring winds. This was a place with the kind of summer nights that should only be real in stories. Lanterns hung from lines between tall brick buildings. Flowers were blooming. There was a particular smell in the air that only arrives in May and after, and errant fireflies were lighting the parks. People wandered from place to place carelessly, purposelessly. She saw a young woman pull another out into the cobbled street and both of them spun, holding onto each others' arms and laughing, looking from one another to the sky and back, skirts floating like parachutes in a wind of their own making. Olivier had no idea how to act like that. Olivier wondered if she ever had known.

She followed the rest of them, figuring they'd probably notice if she took cover, and looked around on opening to the door to the place they'd chosen. It was warmer inside, as though that was necessary on such a night, dark and rather less crowded than the first places they'd stopped, and she could see Roy leaning against the bar smirking like he owned the city. She wanted to wonder how he got away with it. There wasn't much to wonder, though, he was powerful, he was attractive, he knew both of those things and how to use them.

She came to stand next to him and said nothing. Fortunately, he supplied more than enough words for both of them.

"Liv, my man," he began. This was not a good way to begin. He seemed to realize that. "I mean, um, General Armstrong - my man. How's your night going? You seem quiet."

She rolled her eyes.

"I, for one, have gotten four girls' numbers already, and it's only midnight. Very promising. You ought to try it."

She tilted her head and glared, which she hoped signified that she would not be trying whatever it was. He sipped his whiskey and seemed undeterred.

"I'm sure you could be charming. You have to have it somewhere in there. I mean you're carrying a sword, got that hair in front of your face, mysterious, dangerous. Get the old dashing-hero thing going for you, you'd break some hearts. Hell, you might even be better at it than me."

"If you're insinuating - "

"What? That I'd be interested? I know you too well for that."

Olivier nodded. At least he wasn't that far gone. A couple of men had approached her that night and had been roundly rejected. Her relationship with Roy was already difficult, seeing how he couldn't be professional at work or out of it (he should've figured out that only Miles was allowed to call her Liv-my-man) and she didn't want to add this to the mess.

"I propose a wager. You look like you need to have some fun and I need a challenge."

"You're already inheriting my house."

"Bragging rights only."

Olivier considered. On one hand, she was certain of her ability to win any fight. On the same hand, he needed to remember that he did not have the same ability. And yet on the other, she wasn't in the habit of taking up such nonsense with anyone, especially people who were not her friends. She didn't do things like this. It was beyond her how she was with them at all, let alone making bets with Roy Mustang. Maybe she'd been melting under the crowds and close spaces of Central City, or her edge was dulling since she'd begun work at Central Command. She knew there was no other way, that she had to see through what she'd started when they overthrew Bradley, that she even wanted to be part of this new thing they were building.

How had wanting to be part of building a new government landed her here? In a bar along a brightly-lit back-road during summer proper, instead of the slight thaw she was used to? How was building something better equivalent to standing with the most insufferable man in the world, looking across the room to where his slightly-less insufferable team was now dancing?

She allowed herself to be taken aback by that for a second. After all, Falman was so off-beat that somebody had to appreciate it. It would be a waste otherwise.

"I'll bet you, for bragging rights, that I can win over that girl before you do." He gestured with his drink toward a young woman sitting at the other end of the bar.

"But - "

"Neither of us knows her, she might very well be with someone, and neither of us might be what she's after in any case. Precisely. It's absolute chance."

She nodded. This was why it would be such a terrible idea.

"But, but - anything could come of that chance. You could beat me. How often does that happen?" He smirked again, and the look on his face still said he owned the whole city, and that look could have driven her to accept any number of challenges. They shook hands.

"Now it's just a matter of both of us finding an opening to talk with her."

Roy finished his drink and went to his team, leaving Olivier standing on her own and feeling slightly, if only slightly, less alone. Perhaps she should just stand here a minute. Or something. Or maybe she should go and talk to the girl.

Or - no. No. The girl was now walking toward her. This was terrifying. Olivier would be felled by a girl. But then, if Falman could dance that badly and with such confidence, she could manage this.

“Hello!” The girl called, waving unmistakably at Olivier, despite how she had already approached and was only five feet away by now. It was like a salute, except there was no elegance to it and no respect in it. It was entirely unnecessary. All in all, then, nothing like a salute. Her exuberance was concerning, especially since Olivier had never seen her before, and the girl should’ve been close enough by now to figure that out.

Trust her luck to almost get what she needed and then miss. Instead of the girl coming over to talk with her, she’d come over mistaking her for somebody else, and presumably wouldn’t be interested any longer once she realized the facts. If she ever realized. It was strange enough that she’d mistaken Olivier for anyone, because Olivier didn’t look like anyone, but to mistake her that close up should be impossible.  

“Oh! I thought - hello anyway, if you don’t mind.” She tipped her chin onto her hand and smiled at Olivier. There was no pretense in that smile. She was saying nonsense, but saying it sincerely. Olivier should’ve been angrier about that, she hated it, was notorious for hating it, when people spoke without thinking. And yet the girl’s dark eyes were so guileless that she couldn’t quite mind. Target engaged.

Roy had said that between her hair and her sword she could be good at this game. She could play her strengths and seem attractive. And she wasn’t nearly as annoyed by the girl herself as she’d assumed. All might not be lost. She gave the girl what she hoped was a charming smile and leaned a little closer.

“My name’s Lily,” the girl stuck out her hand and Olivier took it. They didn’t shake, just stood there holding hands by way of greeting. Very odd.

“I’m - Liv.” She decided against saying anything of her full name. It tended to intimidate people. She was hardly the type to have her picture in papers and wasn’t easily recognized, so if someone approached her like she was a stranger instead of a public figure, she didn’t correct them. She’d been called a hero as well as a menace, for different reasons, and neither seemed to help her luck with women. Nothing seemed to help that.

She had never romanced Jane or Adriana or Elise - good lord, Elise, now that was a situation she’d never understood and never would - they had just shown up in her life and stayed until further notice. That further notice had been any number of things, but it was never her call when they showed up in the first place. She’d never had to do anything like this.

She tried to think about what Roy might do here. All of it was so bold and stupid that it had to be scrapped immediately.

“I’m sort of running away from somebody right now, do you mind if I stay here a minute?” she asked. That was rather bold, to share her situation immediately.

“Are you in danger?”

“Oh, no, it’s just how - well, you know how it is, sometimes they’re frightful, and I can barely - not that I don’t want to talk to you, that is. Are you, um, are you from around here? I just moved.” The girl was stumbling over her words, still, and Olivier wasn’t sure what to make of it. If she was running away from someone, then her situation must have been rather dire. But if she was trying to make casual conversation with Olivier, then how was she planning to neutralize the threat? And how could a girl fit so many words into a sentence without saying anything? This was all more than made sense to her.

“Briggs is my home,” she said, instead of trying to work anything out just yet.

Lily looked wide-eyed, and suddenly seemed to be more interested in staring at her than talking to her. Maybe it was the hair. Sometimes people were disapproving of the hair.

Olivier pushed it out of her eyes and tried to think back to what she’d actually said, and was considering how to proceed when Roy swooped in. He didn’t walk over to them, he didn’t approach. He slid, boldly, so that he made himself a clear part of their conversation before he had said anything, and so that his focus was clearly on their target. He did not mean this to be a conversation for three and didn’t try to make it one, even vaguely, just turned right to Lily and fixed her with a gaze that, Olivier thought, was supposed to look bold and dangerous.

It didn’t.

“Someone as pretty as you should be dancing,” he said, smirking like he’d won already. He hadn’t. That was the worst line she had ever heard. It was delivered so well that it seemed to be working. He had such a certainty to his ridiculousness, and looked at any girl with such sharp intent, such a sentence sounded sensible coming from him. He talked like he was infatuated with whoever was in front of him. It was utterly convincing.

It was no wonder, then, that she looked flustered. Maybe this was what they meant when they called him dashing, this way he looked at people. He could burn this building down but he was choosing to look at a stranger like she was the extraordinary one. She might’ve been the only person worth paying attention to in the entire room. There was power in that.

“I don’t usually - ”

“Perfect,” he said, and led her away by the hand without letting her say more. In his defense, of course, she let herself be led, and seemed content with it. It was still a move that reeked of Roy, and that annoyed her.

Olivier caught a few more words of their conversation, including the phrase “flame alchemist.” Twice. That frightful excuse for a general really had introduced himself as The Flame Alchemist, instead of just using his name like a regular person. Yet he did it with such a clever tilt to his head and a slight hesitancy in his eyes. As though he knew he was a hero and was somewhat proud of it, but not too proud, and not too bold about it.  

Olivier wished she was capable of something like it. She should try it once Roy relinquished his hold on the girl. Maybe that would overwhelm her, having two people do the same thing to her in an evening.

He danced the same way he talked, which was to say, mostly for show. When they were both younger, he had tried an act like this on her. It hadn’t worked.

She had challenged him in response, swords only, won in a few strategic moves, and had not considered it again. He had not complained that swords were unfair and old-fashioned, as most men did when she challenged them to that form of combat, and she almost admired him for keeping silent about that.

From what she could see he was leaning far too close to Lily and dancing far too slowly, talking all the while. She kept ducking her head and laughing, at a perpetual loss for what to say. Roy did that to girls. He fascinated and perplexed them in equal measure until they sort of blushed and nodded and looked at him with their eyes full of stars. Galaxies. They thought he understood those galaxies. Whether he did or didn’t wasn’t so much the point, because whether he did or not, he’d never tell them. He only left them curious. He only stored up everything they wanted to tell him, and never revealed any truths in return.

Meanwhile, Olivier had decided to gather some truths, in the form of asking the rest of their little group - who were still dancing - what she ought to do to gather a girl’s interest. .

Havoc insisted, “I know everything about this, and so will you if you learn from me.” Which was not specific or true in the slightest.

Riza, said, “Defend her! Fight her! No, no I mean, fight for her. Find somebody to fight because you like her so much!” Breda nodded enthusiastically and pointed at Riza, to indicate his agreement while continuing to drink whatever blue concoction he’d acquired. That particular plan might work. Except, of course, that if she suggested a duel now, he’d do something outrageously gallant-looking and win the girl over in a snap. Olivier would look cold and he’d win immediately.

And Fuery said “bake her cookies,” which - well, there were a hundred things wrong with that. Falman continued dancing like a perplexed jellyfish. There was a bizarre charm to the perplexed-jellyfish dance.

It was all terrible advice. She would’ve said that if these were her own men, and trusted that it would leave no hard feelings among them. This team, though, they were from warmer weather, and she knew she had to be tactful. Now that Miles was away she needed allies. She was going to have to get used to this, and to them.

Olivier saw them separate, the girl spinning away with her skirt flying up around her, eventually slowing to a walk and then that walk turning into her stopping and sticking her head out an open window. She leaned like she might fall, and Roy didn’t follow. Instead, he went back to them, still smirking as usual.

“All is not lost, gentlemen,” he said as dramatically as ever. It was almost like he didn’t notice how the girl he’d been dancing with was now half-leaning and half-hanging out of a window, knocking the tip of one high heel against the wall, rhythmically.

“You know the new consultant we just got? That’s her. Right over there. That girl’s going to be working in our offices starting tomorrow.”

“And presumably she’s half out a window now because of you. Not looking good.” Havoc said it before Olivier could.

“It may be time for a different strategy, that I concede.”

There was something beautiful about the girl leaning out the window. There was something about her that Olivier liked. She was not made of the winter, like so many other girls Olivier had taken an interest in, but she was made of something honest as cold, and that was intriguing. That was, as long as this team and Roy didn't scare her away. 

 

 


	2. Stone Walls of Harmony Hall

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Alex arrives and Olivier is oblivious.

She heard Alex’s singing booming from the kitchen from the minute she walked into the house. It was about eleven at night, and she was not ready for this at all. Of course if he hadn’t been so loud, she might’ve just ignored it, but from the enthusiasm in his voice, she imagined his cooking project was going well. Notwithstanding the fried cheese a stranger had handed her in the last bar they went to, she was quite hungry, and wasn’t going to pass up the opportunity to get something decent before she slept. It was one of the main reasons that she let Alex back into the house after the apocalypse. The other reason, which she’d never admit out loud, was that she actually liked having him around sometimes. Only sometimes. Very few occasions, really, but just enough that he was permitted to stay. 

“Sister!” he yelled when she entered the room. Like Lily’s waving from before, she wondered why he had to greet her so when she was standing a kitchen-counter length away from him. 

“Hello, Alex.” She took a bottle of mango juice from the icebox, because if there was one thing that she did appreciate about living in Central, it was that. Olivier liked to think of herself as too tough for nearly everything, but damn if it she couldn’t take advantage of the grocery store. She had earned that. 

“You look troubled, sister! What ails you?” 

_ What ails me is your lack of volume control,  _ she thought. 

“I made a bet with Roy. He’s decided that he can charm a girl before I can. I thought it would be over fast, even if I lost, but it turns out the girl he picked is about to start working at Central Command. I can’t back down and I’m already sick of competing with that man.” 

He handed her a bowl of stir-fry and started giving advice. She had asked for neither, and while the food was welcome, the advice was not. She did not need advice. She could do this on her own merit. 

Or at least, she was too proud to suggest anything else. 

“There will be no competition! There are only three things that you have to do. First, defend her honor from a threat. Then tell her that you like her much better than anyone else. And then you give her something to show your affection.”

This sounded frightfully like the team’s advice from before. Fight someone for her, bake her cookies, and - well, no. The dancing hadn’t really been advice, unless that advice was  _ lose all semblance of coordination.  _ Coming from her brother it was still bad advice, and possibly it was even worse because it was coming from him, because she had practically raised him and now he was telling her how to handle this encounter. 

“I don’t think there’s anything to defend her from. She’s shy and unassuming. Anyone who would threaten her ought to be ashamed of themselves for it. I don’t have cowards like that working for me!” 

Alex looked at her, tilted his head, and then started laughing with the same alarming volume that he’d been doing everything else that evening. She was probably headed for another speech about how she wasn’t in the North anymore, this wasn’t Briggs, and while none of her people would threaten such a girl, the ones here just might. 

“And if someone did threaten her, it’s a disservice for me to stand between them. She must learn to defend herself if she cannot already.” 

“It’s not that she couldn’t do it! It’s the principle! The message! You’re telling her that you’re willing to work for her! Put yourself in danger for her!” Alex was now gesturing as well as yelling. 

She fixed him with a glare and kept eating the stir-fry. Sometimes all one could do with Alex was let him go, and commend his advice, and leave him feeling as though he’d done something even if he hadn’t. It didn’t really require a response. He could ramble about the merits of chivalry forever, especially if he thought he was advising his dear sister on it, and there was not much that would stop him without upsetting him. 

“And she would think you romantic! You would win the bet immediately! You would win her heart!” 

“I don’t want her heart.”

Alex was not very happy with that response, and wouldn’t accept it until she went upstairs to sleep. Even then he didn’t accept it, just accepted that they both needed rest. 

-

Jean was sitting at his desk, smoking peacefully and strumming a banjo, when Olivier walked into the Team Mustang office at about noon the following day. She was there on the pretense of business, which was mostly to ensure that Roy hadn’t done anything too outrageous when she wasn’t looking. It had only been about twelve hours, alas, Roy could have done anything in twelve hours. 

Jean barely looked toward her when she opened the door. He wasn’t looking at his work, whatever it was supposed to be that day, and wasn’t paying much attention to the chords he was playing either. Instead, he was staring at the office door. She could hear faint voices through it, one low and smooth and the other halting. The first meeting between the new consultant and her rival, then, although why he cared was beyond Olivier. 

“Good morning,” she said, trying very hard to keep her voice steady and to make her smile friendly instead of threatening. The combination of the cigarette and the instrument made that difficult. She’d never allow such a thing. But then, she and Roy had promised a long while ago that she wouldn’t yell at anyone on his team if he wouldn’t flirt with anyone on hers. Their offices were separated by a mere hallway, and that space had been chaos prior to their agreement. It often saw people rushing from one side to the other (one could not do anything under Olivier’s iron glare or Roy’s persistent smirk) and particular members of each would hide out in one another’s spaces when things really had to get done. It had been some good for team bonding, but certainly had not for productivity. 

“I need some lyrics,” Jean announced with a sudden puff of smoke. 

“I’m afraid I’m not good at lyrics,” she said, instead of singing at him to  _ get off that damned banjo _ . A sung reprimand was still a reprimand, and would probably count as yelling if it came from her. 

The voices finally stopped, and a cheery “I’m on it!” came from the other side of the door before it opened, shut, and the girl from the night before slid down to sitting right in front of it. She ran a hand over her eyes and made a sort of exasperated humming sound. Her other hand held her skirt in place while she adjusted herself to sit cross-legged. With her head bent like that, Olivier could see a pen stuck through the bun in her hair, either for storage or to hold the thing in place. Unprofessional The girl exhaled, raised her head, and her eyes widened. 

She straightened and saluted Olivier without standing, and stumbled a greeting which sounded like ‘hello, sir.’ It was not particularly clear. The girl would have to work on her speaking at some point. She’d also need to learn a proper salute. It was perhaps permissible for a first day, especially since she seemed troubled by the whole matter, but Olivier made a note to teach her these things if she didn’t know them already. She then turned to Jean.  

“I’m so sorry. I didn’t mean to be dramatic just there, it was - a long morning. I walked out and thought I was alone. Figured - Fuery? - left his stereo running. Instead of it being your banjo.”  

Maybe she wasn’t an incompetent speaker. That was strange. Lily seemed reluctant to mention that they’d met (and on realizing that she was a General, who wouldn’t be?), but she clearly had some difficulty on the previous night too. Her stumbling, then, was selective. Olivier knew she wasn’t glaring. The girl didn’t seem that intimidated by her rank, either, seeing as she hadn’t stood. It must be something else that left her less than eloquent.  

“Boss was that bad, huh?” Jean asked, changing the chord progression to something a little brighter, perhaps to offset whatever the girl’s mood was darkening into in the wake of Roy. 

“Not bad, just - odd? Certainly gave me enough to do, but then he said so many other things I could barely figure out what was directions and what was him making really - um.”

“Making really bad fire puns?” 

“Yes! Exactly! I was so confused. I thought the meeting was about my job and then half of it wasn’t.”

“Did he say a _ lot  _ of things about your eyes?” 

“Yeah. Come to think of it, yeah.” She nodded slowly, presumably understanding what had happened and from there, reorienting the world from one in which he was just eccentric and vain to one in which he was flirting with her. Olivier had seen this happen enough times to recognize it, recognized the stages of confusion cross her face, but where most girls finished the cycle by looking content, if not delighted, Lily looked stricken. She pulled the pen from her hair and started drawing something on her hand. 

“Did he make any bad fire puns  _ about  _ your eyes?” Jean continued, oblivious to the set of emotions she’d just experienced. 

She thought about this, then nodded.

“He’s pulling out all the stops, then.” 

“Oh, dear. I see.”

Lily replaced the pen, touched her left hand to her right, and a faint light surrounded her palm and the cup on her desk. She got up, finally, and moved to her actual place in the office. It was right next to the desk Olivier had temporarily taken. The girl seemed to be pointedly ignoring Olivier. This was fine, she could do what she had to do indirectly. 

“How do you know exactly what he said?” Olivier asked. She was pretty sure of the answer, but it would be rather hilarious to see Lily hear it for herself. It would also begin clearing her way to win their game. If Lily was especially proud, it might end the game altogether. 

“I’ve been working with him for years, seen him try it enough times.”

Lily chose to ignore that comment instead of becoming indignant. A shame. Most girls that Roy went after were horrified that he said the same things to all of them. Lily hadn’t reacted at all, which meant she was either very used to this or very unused to it. Either way, Roy was still very much in the game as far as Olivier could tell. 

She took a sip from her cup and grinned, suddenly sparkling with energy rather like Alex did at times. Whatever she had alchemized delighted her. It couldn’t have been a sizable thing, the light was far too faint, but she was clearly happy with herself. 

“What was that?” Olivier asked. 

“Targeted coffee-brewing, General, sir. Good practice for a day of thinking in arrays. Not practical in the long-term, of course, takes rather more energy out of me than using a percolator, but the whole process - well, anyhow.”

Astonishing. She’d almost completed a whole thought there. Olivier tried another tactic. 

“What are you working on here?” 

“Water purification system for out at the Reconstruction. We’ve got some inefficient ways, but if it could be alchemised on a large scale - well, everything might be easier. Sir.” 

There it was. Full sentences. She said them when she had something to get her started. Now the only challenge was to get her started more often. And maybe to get them using first names outside the office.

”Have you got lyrics for this?” Jean asked, playing his chosen chord progression again. 

”Sounds kind of familiar. Give me a minute on it.”

Olivier stood to leave, rather finished with this for now. 

“If you ever need a place to actually work, you’re welcome to my office, dear Lily. I’m on the other side of this hall.”

As the girl tried to stammer out a response, she left, wondering what precisely she could be doing so wrong that Lily couldn’t even speak around her. 


	3. A Moose in a Parking Lot

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Liv doesn’t know how to flirt. Consequently, she flirts far more than she intends to.

There was a lot of “do not cross” tape in front of her office door the next morning. Not unheard of, not convenient, and not expected. This wasn’t what she’d wanted for this Thursday, there were plans in the works that she wasn’t fond of rescheduling, and she intended to tell whoever was in there behind the tape that they had better leave before they got a piece of her mind. Whatever ought not to be crossed shouldn’t have tried to cross her.

The tape also said “crime scene.” As though someone other than her had authority over what was and wasn’t a crime in her own space! Certainly, her window appeared to be broken, but she was perfectly capable of catching the perpetrator. A few well-placed questions and ice-cold glares and she’d have back whatever had been taken from her. These wilting roses who ran Central Command couldn’t withstand her vague annoyance, let alone real anger. She could easily deal with it.

“Why are you in here?” she asked, her voice barely raised. Nonetheless, all the clatter around the door stopped and everyone turned to look at her. She could see fear in a couple of faces already. This was what she meant about wilting roses. 

“Your office was broken into,” said a man she didn’t know. She could tell that by looking in and seeing the shattered window, thanks very much, but when were they going to leave? 

It seemed never, at least until they got permission from whoever they needed to get it from. This was how things worked, and why Olivier did not envy them their jobs, because they were always having to ask for permission for things that could’ve been done three years ago if there had been fewer people to ask. As it was, everything had to run through a system. 

And if that system broke, the world would not stop experiencing night and day, trees would not cease their lifecycles of gaining and losing their leaves, the daisies would still bloom around the pond at the other side of the building. No one seemed to realize that essential fact. 

But then, this was how they kept chaos at bay, and so she couldn’t fault them for doing it. Actually she could, but it was oftentimes too much trouble to fault them, and so she just went on her way, leaving them to handle it. 

Back home when her office was broken into, it was a simple matter of fighting off the one who did it – person or beast, usually they’d still be in her office, having no one to drive them out before she got there – and maybe there was something to be grateful for, in that she wasn’t dealing with that anymore. There were a couple of memorable occasions that involved bears in the office.

Maybe there was less to be grateful for when people who weren’t her were now examining the contents of her desk, trying to see if anything important was missing. This seemed futile. If something was gone, how could they know it had been there?

They said she had to leave because it was a crime scene.

She said they were idiots.

They pushed her aside anyway.

On getting out into the hallway, she realized that there were only a few options to be had, and she chose the one that would probably annoy her the most but would also get her the most information. She traversed the familiar space with as much caution as she had before the agreement, when it was typical to see someone or another fleeing from either side. She paused before knocking when she finally arrived at the team’s door, because something felt off. There was a silence she wasn’t used to coming from the other side of the door, and that was deeply concerning. There was almost never pure silence in that office.  

There was a purposeful sort of cough, and then some brief clicking and static, and then two very deep breaths.

“This is demo one of  _ Car Park Moose Chaos, _ recording.” There was silence, and then the slowly increasing volume of a banjo intro, and then some completely incongruous singing. The recorder clicked off very shortly after. This wouldn’t be good. It might be funny, though, and if she had to wait to see who was running around breaking into her office, she could do with a laugh.

“No! No, you’re too  _ melancholy! _ ”

“Your fault for giving it such a ridiculous name,” said a voice which was unmistakably Riza’s. “How am I supposed to sing something in line with that name?”

“It’s your fault for being the only one who can sing!”

At this, Olivier knocked and walked in. Predictably, Jean and Riza were sitting on the floor with a recorder between them. Jean held a banjo and Riza looked very annoyed. Fuery sat a little ways away, moving the dials on a radio that seemed hooked up to the recorder. If this was live, they were definitely going to have problems. Well, even if this wasn’t live, there were certainly problems with it.

“What is this project called?” She asked.

“ _ Car Park Moose Chaos,”  _ Jean repeated. There hadn’t been a block between the words and her hearing, that really was what he said. She half-hoped that the door between them made it sound worse, and it was actually called – but there might not be anything that sounded like that and was in fact better.

“An utterly incoherent name.”

Riza nodded and gave her one of those looks that often passed between them. It said something like,  _ it’s just us between them and the world.  _ There was a lot of love for them in the way Riza said that, though, even if she was saying it only with a stoic expression and a tilt of her head.

She took a seat at an empty desk and decided to wait for Roy’s door to open. If anyone knew who had broken into her office, it was probably going to be him. Maybe he’d done it himself, in the service of some plan he’d come up with. It would be like him to do that and then tell her later.

“What do you mean? You came up with it yesterday!” Jean sounded indignant at this.

She tried to remember saying anything yesterday that might have prompted this, and couldn’t. That girl’s – Lily’s – face was frightfully prominent in her memory, even though they had only talked a few times, and she had been afflicted with the same wordlessness each time.  

“When you said that I was too disorganized.”

“You told him he was ‘as confused and disorganized as a moose in a parking lot.”

Oh. There was no sense arguing with Fuery’s memory, and it did sound like her. That was the kind of analogy that life at Briggs lent itself to, the damned things found their way into all sorts of places they shouldn’t. It was a wonder, too, because they were too massive to go unnoticed, but they still managed to get in sometimes as the larger doors closed, the ones that moved too slowly and were too unwieldy to prevent it. The garages where they parked the tanks were just one such place. She and Miles and –  _ no, don’t go there  _ – they had found themselves on many an evening trying to lure one of the creatures out. Unlike bears, it seemed too ruthless to fight them. It didn’t help how Miles always said, ‘but look at their  _ antlers _ , Liv, they’re just so precious!’ and there was no argument after that.

He was capable and cold enough in the rest of his life. If some tree-branches sticking out of an animal’s head moved him, so be it. She could respect that. They had never, the three of them –  _ three of them, one missing now, don’t go there – _ harmed a moose.  

All this probably added up to a fondness for Jean that she wasn’t admitting. She was happy to go on not admitting it and hiding it in comments that could probably be called insulting, but were also true.    __

“Right, so I was going to call it Moose  _ havoc, _ but that would just be vain.”

“Of course.”

This office was a surreal place.

It was made more surreal when Lily walked in a minute later holding two different-sized guitars and talking at a rate that no one ought to talk.

“Here it is, I got two, but listen, I don’t know if we can use either.” She tried to move further forward and stopped, finally noticing the hem of her skirt caught in the door. She turned around and yanked. One of the guitars made a clattering sound, startling Lily herself more than anyone else in the office if the look on her face was to be believed, and she seemed rather flustered. She certainly belonged in this office if she couldn’t figure out how to get her skirt out from a doorframe. 

The yanking finally didn’t avail her, so she opened the door, closed it again with as much dignity as she still had, and then kept talking as if nothing had happened. This either meant she was embarrassed or that she got caught in doors regularly. At this rate, they were equally probable.  

“See this one I got from a blond teenager out in the courtyard between here and the university, nice kid, brightest eyes. He said he could transmute another one just like that, and then he did, so I took him up on it. But then there was another blond teenager sitting next to him and yelling at me the whole time about how I most certainly was  _ not  _ taller than him. I don’t know how I offended, but we should be cautious.”

With that, she handed the one in question to Riza. Havoc’s hands were still full of his banjo, and he was playing what was either charming background music or an infernal racket. Olivier’s opinion would’ve landed squarely in infernal racket, but nobody else seemed to mind, so she was trying not to care either.

“I got this other one from a Major who was feeding the birds in the same courtyard, he went back to his office for it and everything so I couldn’t refuse. I don’t know his name. He did say, but his mustache sort of obscured it. From what I could gather, this thing has been in his family for  _ generations.  _ I figure whatever you need a guitar for won’t keep it intact, though, so we probably shouldn’t use it.”

The possible futility of her search seemed to be dawning on her slowly.

“What  _ do _ you need a guitar for? Is this some undercover thing?”

Olivier, by this point, was glaring colder than a blizzard at Jean. She knew it and he knew it and neither of them was averting their gaze. She refused, and Jean looked caught by now.

“You sent her out for this and you didn’t tell her why?”

On hearing Olivier, Lily turned and tried to salute with her left hand, which was still holding one of the guitars.

”Morning sir!” She sort of bounced and nodded as she said it. The guitar almost collided with her face. 

Just as Olivier thought, that guitar had not been in the family for generations. The girl had clearly run into Alex for the second guitar, and he was certainly wrong. Either her brother was telling tall tales, or he was talking about the Armstrong method of playing guitar, which one could only really carry out while fighting a worthy adversary, preferably a mountain lion. None were on hand, and even if there were, she doubted anybody but Riza would be capable of carrying that method out. 

“Everybody quiet!” Jean called. The same static sounds as before, and then,  _ This is Car Park Moose Chaos, take two. _

This was when Roy chose to emerge from his office. The banjo was actually kind of catchy, and Riza wasn’t singing so there was just the one melody, and it was nice. Almost. Lily slowly moved her arm down, and set the other guitar on the nearest desk with an impressive silence.

Roy started clapping along.

For a change in percussion, Roy slapped a desk.

The ceiling crumbled.

\--

Nobody could see very clearly in the clouds of falling dust. From the vague shapes, they were all armed and had drawn their weapons. Thankfully, despite his gloves being on now, Roy had not yet set anything on fire. Jean and Riza were holding out their guns, looking around as though the threat would emerge presently. Olivier had her hand on her sword, but it wasn’t out, she found caution was always the better way.

Lily was standing next to the window, which she had opened, holding a dagger in one hand and trying to wave everyone through, circling her arm while yelling “out, out, out!” like that was going to direct them. Fuery was the only one who had been directed, and he had landed in the bushes for his trouble.

“Rutherford!” she shouted.

“Yes what! I mean sir! Yes what sir!”

“You’re going to stab someone. Stop waving your hands around if you’re armed.”

She said nothing, but she did stop.  

“Oh,” said Roy in the growing silence. They were all still waiting for a threat to jump out at them but they were all, at one rate or another, understanding what it had really been. The disadvantage of alchemy without a circle was, of course, that certain gestures could cause chaos. The disadvantage of such destruction in an office where everyone had seen and fought horrors was, of course, the present state of panic. Everyone had rather exhausted themselves with it by now and was moving into a state of relief, and a couple of them were sitting down again from it. Lily was half out the window, breathing.  

“I should work on that,” he continued brightly, as though he was discussing how he might improve his writing skills, and not how he should refrain from further destroying the building. “Olivier, can we use your office until it’s back up?”

She did not answer, but her glare gave more than enough context: there was no way they would be using her space.

\--

By about noon, they had relocated to a shady place under a tree. Riza had checked the area once-over, and was sitting in a tree, keeping watch for any threats from above while simultaneously doing more paperwork than anybody on the ground. With the exception of Falman, who had moved his desk outside so he didn’t have to sit in the grass, the rest of them were doing very little productive. 

“You are not going near the break-in site,” Roy was announcing to Lily, trying to sound stern, but there was a strange mix of laughter and indignation written all over the girl’s face. Everything in her expression said she knew something he didn’t, and he was losing to that expression quickly. She also revealed none of the usual blush or shyness that came over most girls when Roy flirted with them. Olivier admired her iron composure. Even she had been a little thrown when Roy tried his charm on her. It was disarming, to have someone so intent on you, no matter who you were. And yet this one seemed not to notice it at all. 

The only person who he didn’t do this with was Riza. Because Riza listened anyway. They never had to use tactics on one another, either of them. She saw them together often enough. Roy was able to drop his flirtatious act, and Riza clearly breathed easier, when they were beside one another. It seemed to be the only place either found relief. Even today, before he’d started in on their new recruit, Roy periodically glanced up into the tree, as though Riza’s presence there was keeping him afloat. 

In turn, Riza did not mind at all. She’d have turned her arsenal on anybody else. 

But it was funny to see him working against another who played on the fact that she was in possession of some information the others weren’t. That was his entire strategy, always, and now she was using it too. It was like seeing two people with the same brand of alchemy in a fight, but infinitely more entertaining, because one of them was her competitor.

Lily had offered a couple of times to go and see what was happening, because in her words,  _ all this city planning is making me restless, let me see what’s up around there. _ It hadn’t gone over well. Olivier was going to break it to her that nobody was allowed in, at some point, but for now she was rather content to see what the girl’s response to Roy would be. 

He was leaning toward her, and towering a little over her, and smirking for all he was worth. 

“You’re here to work on design, and you’re not trained for - ”

“Two years. I was a guide in the southwestern woods for two years! _ ” _

“What I’m trying to say is - ”

“There are things out there. You got your bears and then you got your other bears and then there’s these hollow-eyed sort of shadows,” Lily ticked off the potential threats, tapping her pen against her fingers for each one, then thought for a moment and continued, a little wistfully. “Man, those are an interesting challenge, but if you get one you can’t eat ‘em so  - oh. Too blunt?”

Roy had, for a moment, fully transformed from convicted and stern to  _ what the hell _ , and Olivier was absolutely dying with laughter. 

“You’re still not going into that office. That is final. I’m supposed to be protecting you.”

“Excuse me,” said Olivier, trying for a smooth voice and failing exceptionally. Indeed, she probably just sounded frightening. She tried to push Roy out of the way as she turned her attention toward Lily. “I believe  _ I’m  _ the one protecting her.” 

“When’d you - decide that?” 

Yes, she’d definitely miscalculated. Scared the girl. She was turning so red, and looking like she was trying to lean toward Olivier while backing away from her at the same time, trying to look away from her and look at her at the same time. She seemed very unsteady, and very suddenly, for someone who found it entertaining to fight creatures which she described as hollow-eyed shadows. 

_ This _ was why she would be the best person to handle the break-in; if she could unravel a forest guide’s composure that fast without even trying, she could certainly intimidate a thief into confessing. 

“If you’re amenable to that, of course.” she put a hand on Lily’s arm, trying to speak a little softer, attempting to be calming. 

By this point, the girl was practically shaking. 

“Listen, I didn’t - I don’t - that’s pretty inconvenient protecting yourself and me, you know?” 

“Not if you stay close to me.” She said this even more quietly, practically a whisper, seeing as how she didn’t want anyone else to think the offer was for them. Her only goal was to break the girl’s faith in Roy’s charms, if she indeed had any. 

“Yeah okay. Let’s um. Let’s go.” 


	4. Chapter 4

“Here, what do you think of this?” Havoc asked, handing Roy a notebook. It was full of scribbled-out lines of writing, some of which were re-copied at the bottom of the page. Almost none of it seemed to have passed that test, and more than likely none of it should have.  

It had something to do with tractors and love. Driving a tractor while being in love, or perhaps falling in love because of the particular experience of driving a tractor, he wasn’t certain. He wondered why that was the metaphor of choice, seeing as Havoc lived in an apartment in Central and hadn’t driven a tractor in years. Perhaps there was some connection between the authenticity of being in the country and the authenticity of being in love. 

Roy didn’t want to be honest. He didn’t want to be dishonest. How could he be tactful in this situation? It wasn’t bad practice, he thought, for when he’d have to do precisely this as president. This was going to be decent learning. 

“I can certainly tell you wrote it,” he began. No, that wasn’t enough. 

He tried again. 

“A song, you know, is a lot more about the tune.”

Not quite what he meant. 

“I think it’s very interesting. Can I make a few - ah, careful notes?” 

Havoc seemed pleased with that, so he started. This song was about the woman of Havoc's dreams, so he should probably start there. What was a dream woman like? He scribbled a few notes like  _excellent shot,_   _takes no shit,_   _childhood friend, ridiculously smart,_  and other things that he figured anybody might want in a partner, and then got to work writing a song about that person.

When he was done, he threw it up to Riza, who was still perched in the tree on the lookout for danger. There was none to be found yet, unless Havoc's lyrical genius counted as such. 

Havoc himself, meanwhile, wandered across the field and started playing his banjo. The pressure of having his lyrics read seemed too much for him. 

“I’m flattered, sir,” Riza said after a moment, absolutely deadpan. “But I don’t believe it’s appropriate for you to be writing songs about me.” 

Blessedly, the rest of their team seemed not to hear them. Falman had straight up left when Riza opened the notebook, Breda was asleep, and Fuery had headphones on that were the size of the moon. He was very grateful, if not for anything else, for that. 

“It’s not about you! It’s about - it’s about the new girl!” 

He could practically see the disbelief on Riza’s face. He was about to look up to check when he felt the notebook hit him on the head again. She’d thrown the thing down with such carelessness, he was nearly offended. Then again, he probably would’ve been more offended if Riza had accepted it straightaway. She wasn’t the sort of person to do that, and if she tried to start now, he’d wonder what had gone wrong.

“The new girl does not have blond hair, or did you notice?” Riza climbed down somewhat so that she was sitting on the branch directly above Roy, the better to talk with him and - probably - the better to intimidate him. 

“Well she’s - ”

“Not capable of, and I quote,  _ sniping you in the heart with love _ . It’s obvious she prefers alchemy to a firearm.” 

“It’s a metaphor.”

 “She’s  _ metaphorically  _ your lieutenant? I mean she does have more stars in her eyes than I do, but she’s not - wait, you think I’m  _ what? _ ” 

He could’ve talked his way out of all of it, but the lieutenant thing - that was something Roy couldn’t pretend about. Calling anybody else his lieutenant was preposterous and an offense to Riza. It would be like cheating. He simply couldn’t do that.

“You’ll get a lot more listeners if you write something sincere, Sir,” she said, while ascending the tree again. 

Wait. 

Did she mean that she would listen to him if he wrote her something sincere? If he wrote something that wasn’t flirtatious about her, but was about - well, what could it be about? If he really wanted her to listen, he was going to have to work a lot harder than usual. 

He might as well start with his greatest weakness. 

_ You know I’m useless in the rain,  _ he wrote, and then tried valiantly to think how he should approach this without any of his usual trappings. 

 

\--

It was a little misleading for Olivier to say that she’d protect the girl when, in fact, she felt more like she ought to be protected  _ by _ her. First of all, anybody who spent two years in the border-wood needed no protecting. Certainly not anyone who fought with alchemically reinforced daggers. Second, Olivier didn’t actually know the way Lily was taking her. 

They walked along a sunlit brick-walled alley, a winding path with ivy occasionally running up and down its sides, until they reached the university’s main courtyard. This was the best shortcut between the two places, Lily said, and she’d heard it from a number of students, but Olivier had always avoided it. And them. Students were not by a long shot her favorite group of people. They were nearly impossible to connect with, rather impractical, and thought that activities such as eating noodles out of mugs in front of a television were permissible, if not downright encouraged. 

“You never go around here?” Lily asked. 

“Never. Really, could you picture me at the university?” Olivier asked. 

“Well - ” Lily pondered this for a long time. Too long, in Olivier’s mind. There was no reason the girl should be thinking so hard. Of course she didn’t belong with students. She’d proved that before. 

“They asked me to give a lecture once last year,” Olivier admitted. “It went - badly. I gathered everyone in the hall and then rolled out of an elevator driving a tank, demonstrating how to crush an immortal monster, and - they didn’t take it too well.” 

She expected Lily to say something in response about how that was ‘dangerous’ and ‘impractical’ and ‘extremely bad for the floors’ like the Dean had when she explained what she’d done, but she just looked sort of dazed. This was odd. Usually when Olivier talked about the tank stunt, the person listening didn’t look like they found it - somehow romantic. 

“Man,” Lily said thoughtfully, quietly, like she was intending the words only for herself. “If they’d tried to push me off on you, I would’ve never run away.” 

“If who had what?” 

“I was just - you know. Noble family, West City, six girls and no boys. All they could think to do was shove us toward passing men and hope.” 

Olivier did know. Not that family specifically, but the type. Such people weren’t exactly subtle about marrying off their daughters. Behind all the makeup and feigned shyness, none of their girls seemed too happy about it, but neither did they seem capable of escape. It surprised her that even one had gotten out. 

“So you’re saying if you were  _ shoved toward _ me, you wouldn’t mind,” she replied, opting for a quip instead of something more sincere. It was too sunny, too massive a topic, too much a conversation for late at night without so many people around. 

“I’d only mind on principle.” Thankfully, the girl seemed to return her sentiment. And still incredulous, she repeated, “An elevator?”

“Well. Yes. It all started with this ridiculously short alchemist - ” 

Lily went rigid. Was the mention of Edward troubling to her somehow? Perhaps it was, the kid got to different people in different ways. Still, she’d seemed fine when he attacked her about the guitar, she’d accidentally called him short, a subject on which he had only the sharpest of opinions. There was no way that he bothered her that badly. Or, indeed, that he bothered her at all. 

She started to step back very carefully, one hand sliding into the pocket of her dress and the other out in front of her. It looked very like she was preparing to be attacked, but on a college campus? The students here barely had enough wherewithal to fight one another, let alone two military women. The whole time she kept her eyes fixed over Olivier’s shoulder. 

Olivier, for her part, continued to watch Lily. This seemed like the sort of fight that would take place quietly, carefully, and she didn’t want to alert the girl’s attacker or alarm him, whoever he was. Her first instinct was to turn around and charge, but that wasn’t right.  

“Oh  _ hell, _ they couldn’t’ve, oh absolute  _ hell _ -” Lily said quietly, regaining her voice but still looking stricken. She got to the edge of a building and rounded it, pushing herself back against the nearest wall and pulling Olivier in front of her. 

“Rutherford,” called a distinctly male voice. "Hey Rutherford!" 

Lily, without preamble, kissed Olivier.   


End file.
